Boozy Mincemeat and Marzipan Puff

So I have relented on the word 'Puff' following my recent strudel post. I’ve decided it doesn't have to mean that I have indeed baked dragons (or worse!) and as this was a folded filo parcel kinda pudding puff it shall remain, as it really wasn't strudel like. Well sort of but not really. Maybe I need to invent a new word, something catchy like Strupuff or Puffdel perhaps? Yeah, me neither.

Anyway I digress, this was one of those emergency puddings after realising I had half a packet of Filo pastry leftover from baking the strudel, which kinda needed eating 24 hours earlier but a quick sniff and visual check I deemed it was fine, fortunately I had wrapped it in damp paper towel which had kept it moist enough too, as filo is rather evil and dries out so fast! Whilst I had already made a cake for the impending family visit that evening, they are all good eaters and I thought they wouldn’t mind an extra pudding or two! I did joke it was my gigantic size cheffy man size trio of desserts!! I think with my boyfriend being away at the time I was missing cooking for two and it was lovely to have my dad and brother over to feed! 

The pudding was purely made up as I went along throwing nice things together quickly– the marzipan was leftover in the fridge from when I made the GBBO Swedish Princess tortlettes, the beloved Polish cocoa is always in the store-cupboard and the mincemeat was from a half opened jar at some point earlier this year... I do like a recipe that uses up odds n sods! Oh and the brandy was ‘borrowed’ from my dearest’s special imported bottle from South Africa…shh!

Serves 4:

Ingredients:

210g mincemeat
70g marzipan, roughly chopped into ½ cm chunks
10g cocoa powder
2 tbsp brandy
50g butter, melted
4 sheets filo pastry
2 tbsp icing sugar

Method:

Pre-heat oven to 210o.

On a larger sheet of foil or parchment paper, lay out a sheet of filo at  a landscape angle and brush with melted butter, repeat with the remaining 3 sheets, to form a thick rectangle.

Combine the mincemeat, cocoa, marzipan and brandy until nicely mixed. Spoon the filling down the middle of the pastry, leaving an inch from the ends. 

Fold up the left and right sides inwards, brush the top half of the filo with butter, fold up the bottom half and gently tease over the top sheet to overlap. 

Brush liberally with butter and sprinkle over half the icing sugar. Place on a lined baking tray and bake for about 25-30 minutes or until golden and crispy, dust with remaining icing sugar and serve sliced up with lashings of hot custard.

Overall the pudding was very highly received - the slightly boozy, fruity nutty and chocolately filling inside crisp buttery sweet pastry was heavenly and its a definite 'keeper' of a recipe!

It’s also really quite acceptable the next day too cold if you have a spare piece!

As this lush puff used up all sorts of odds n ends I am sending it over to the December No Waste Food Challenge at Elizabeth's Kitchen Diary. Over the year I have really enjoyed taking part and hosting challenges and gained some amazing recipes along the way! Bring on 2015!!